I believe earlier both Mr. T and the movie "They call me mister tibbs" were brought up. Both are examples of individuals who insist on being call 'Mister' as a show of respect. Gene Roddenberry's future is far from perfect, Spock is a vulcan in what appears to be a service dominated by (white) humans. There is sexism in TOS, and maybe still some specie-ism too.

In addition to being an expression of his non-militaristic pacifist believes, mister is a demand for a open show of respect.

T'Girl

I agree with this.

T'Girl wrote:

Sweetheart, the navy calls the people in that position helmsmen. The kids in the official navy press release was refered to as either master helmsman or by his rate of quartermaster or quartermaster third class.

... who've been there and done that ...

If you insist on "conning officer", then back it up with something beyond a simple personal statement.

Ah, see, my comment in Post #75 was based on misunderstanding what you meant by your comment in Post #74.

I thought "The internet's a wonderful thing -- Love getting my facts straight" was your way of saying, "Ah, thanks for explaining that!" I was clearly mistaken. Therefore, there's no need to start getting combative. I certainly wasn't intending to be condescending, and if I came off that way, I apologize. But since you ARE going that route, I'll say that I prefer my years of actual hands on training and operations over your Google searches.